Yummy Chocolate Zucchini Cake

During our recent vacation to Maine, my dear girlfriend Anne made a ridiculously yummy chocolate zucchini cake. She hadn’t made the recipe in about 10 years (it was a blue ribbon winning recipe from her childhood) and the source of the clipping was unknown. I replicated the recipe last week – doubling it, actually, to share with friends – and it was just as wonderful. The cake is light, fluffy, and moist and goes down dangerously easily. I delivered a half batch to our neighbors, and was told the next day that I had outdone my previous baked good gifts; the cake evaporated within about 5 minutes of delivery. Enjoy!

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Chocolate Zucchini Cake

(Click thumbnail above to enlarge; image credit: Christine Koh)

½ cup unsalted butter, softened

½ cup canola oil

1 ¾ cup sugar

2 eggs

1 tsp. vanilla

1/2 cup of sour milk (add 1 tsp. lemon juice to a ½ cup of milk and let stand 5 minutes before using)

2 ½ cups flour

4 Tbl cocoa powder

½ tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

½ tsp cinnamon

½ tsp clove

2 cups finely diced zucchini (remove pulp and seeds from middle of zucchini and use only firm flesh)

1/2 cup chocolate chips (or more; see note below)

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1. Butter and flour a 9 x 13 baking pan or glass baking dish. Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

2. Cream together the butter, oil, and sugar in a large bowl. Add eggs, vanilla, and sour milk and mix well.

3. In a separate bowl, mix dry ingredients (flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, clove) well then add to wet mixture. Do not over mix.

4. Gently stir in zucchini. Spoon batter into prepared pan. Sprinkle chocolate chips over top. Bake at 325 degrees for 40-45 minutes, or until a tester toothpick comes out clean. Cool in pan on rack.

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Notes:

1. If you wish to reduce fat content, you can experiment by subbing in some yogurt for oil…perhaps start with a split of ¼ cup oil and ¼ yogurt.

2. As you can see from the fact that the body of the cake only uses 4 Tbl of cocoa powder, this is a lighter cake; it’s actually a bit more like a spice cake with chocolate accents via the chocolate chips. Anne’s recipe only called for a ¼ cup of chocolate chips on top, which I bumped up to a ½ cup. If you want to create a more chocolate-y cake, stir in extra chocolate chips through the body of the batter at the step where you add the zucchini above.

3. This recipe would translate well to muffins if you want to make a batch for school lunches. Use muffin tins and check for done-ness starting at about 20 minutes.

4. This recipe doubles easily. I found that it was best when still a touch warm (the chocolate chips were oozy). Store in refrigerator and you can heat servings up a touch in the microwave or toaster when needed later.